6 The clause is the basic information unit with typical sentences composed of one to three clauses.
Isthmus Mixe SOVX
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word order in a one-clause sentence from a narrative discourse is shown in example 1.
1.6 Overview of this study
Although the focus of this study is on secondary palatalization in Isthmus Mixe, the material covered includes a range of related phonetic and phonological phenomena. Section 2 is a phonological sketch of
Isthmus Mixe, including phonetic descriptions illustrated with waveforms and spectrograms of various features of the language. Section 3 defines primary and secondary palatalization and gives examples of
each kind of palatalization, especially in the languages of the Mixe-Zoque family. Of particular importance is the presentation of the origin of secondary palatalization in the Mixe languages. Section 4 is a case study
of the effects of secondary palatalization in Isthmus Mixe: a text of fluent continuous speech was digitized for analysis and relevant statistical tests reveal a number of consistent relationships between secondary
palatalization and vowel allophones. Spectrograms illustrate the effects of secondary palatalization in various contexts. Finally, section 5 discusses the implications of the Isthmus Mixe data for theoretical
models of feature geometry and their ability to deal with it adequately. It will be demonstrated that not all the models are equal; in fact, the model developed by Hume 1994 is the best for the data, although this
model is modified to accommodate secondary palatalization as manifested in Isthmus Mixe. Derivations of Isthmus Mixe syllables are shown using the autosegmental model first developed by Goldsmith 1990.
Isthmus Mixe secondary palatalization, which manifests three homophonous morphemes, is considered to be a mutation process Lieber 1987. Thus, what is shown to be an unusual phonetic occurrence in the
language is seen as having important grammatical functions on the morphological level.
2. Phonological sketch of Isthmus Mixe
2.1 The Isthmus Mixe data
The Isthmus Mixe data analyzed in this study are extracted from personal narratives and other monologues spoken by various male and female native speakers and tape-recorded on site by the author, between 1994
and 1999. In addition, a recording of a text read by a male speaker in a professional recording studio in 1995 was purchased. All speakers were from San Juan Guichicovi and Mogoñé, located in the Isthmus of
Tehuantepec, Oaxaca, Mexico.
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Field work began in a related Mixe language, spoken in the village of San José El Paraíso, where the author lived for extended periods of time from 1968–1977, primarily speaking the language of the people
there, Coatlán Mixe. During that time, she co-authored A hierarchical sketch of Mixe as spoken in San José El Paraíso
Van Haitsma [Dieterman] and Van Haitsma 1976. At a later period, 1994–1999, she made four visits of about three weeks each to San Juan Guichicovi and Mogoñé, during which time she lived
with the Isthmus Mixe people, conversed in Mixe with them, tape-recorded native speakers, and took notes during unrecorded conversations in Isthmus Mixe with other speakers and while listening to conversations
among the Mixe people.
In general, the style of language that was analyzed can be described as not completely unmonitored, but also not overly formal; it is somewhat closer to vernacular speech than more formally elicited data,
which tends to be unnaturally slow and overly careful. As Fant 1973:19 has noted: “A common observation when spectrograms of ordinary connected speech are studied is that modifications and
omissions of speech sounds are frequent. Carefully pronounced single testwords and phrases may differ
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SOVX indicates that a peripheral element may follow the verb.
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The names of Mixe speakers are not given because of the potential need for privacy and protection.
7 considerably from ordinary speech.” Although in this study occasional reference is made to elicited words
and sentences, generally, preference is given to the language as used in tape-recorded continuous texts in which the speakers are communicating ideas in narrative contexts. Although, as Labov 1971:460
remarks, “the vernacular is the style which carries the greatest interest for the study of linguistic structure…,” it is recognized that the presence of the linguist and the tape-recorder affects the style of the
speakers to some extent: the observer’s presence colors the data. Therein is the paradox of obtaining data of everyday informal speech.
All of the segments relevant to this study have been analyzed in various contexts using the Speech Analyzer software developed by the Summer Institute of Linguistics, version 1.5 10.6, copyright 1996–
1998, by JAARS—ITCS, Waxhaw, NC. The descriptions of basic acoustic analysis principles by Baart 1999, Fant 1973, Stevens 1998,
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Van Summers 1987, and others were used as guides in the analysis. One selection of fluent continuous speech, 100 seconds long, was digitized for analysis. The speaker
of the text was an Isthmus Mixe male, age 42, of Mogoñé, Oaxaca, Mexico, tape-recorded in a professional recording studio in July of 1995. The text was read in normal unemphatic narrative style. Every native
Mixe word in the selection was analyzed using the Speech Analyzer software described above. The fuller context of the narrative text encompasses the study of the individual elements under consideration. This
continuous text is referred to throughout the study as Text A see Appendix.
2.2 Overview of Isthmus Mixe phonemes
